Акция "Чистый берег" / CLEAN BEACH

Clean Beach Campaign 2018

 Date: 12/05/2018

 Venue: “Tarkhovsky” beach, Kurortny district, St. Petersburg 

The Beach clean-up week takes a head start with simultaneous Clean Beach events in Finland (Helsinki and Turku) and Estonia (Tallinn) on 5th of May and continues with event in St. Petersburg, Russia, on 12th of May

 Program         Video

Support by: Committee for Nature Use, Environmental Protection and Ecological Safety of St. Petersburg

In cooperation:  with Helsinki, Turku and Tallinn.

Coordinated by: SC “Mineral” since 2014

Target groups:  residents, NGOs, schools, youth organisations, environmental volunteers and etc. About 500 participants annually.

More than 500 participants were involved into activities in the frame of campaign. Among participants were representatives of such authorities and organizations as Rosprirodnadzor in NWFD, Neva-Ladoga basin authority, SUE Vodokanal of St. Petersburg, Marine-arctic maritime authority, Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, Administration of Kurortny district, Nord Stream 2 and others. All together they formed 24 teams and joint effort to collect more than 100 bags of garbage.

Vice-governor of St. Petersburg Mr. Mikhail Kucheryavy welcomed participants with words “Living in our wonderful city I am happy to see so many young people. You understand tasks that we need to solve together, including in terms of environmental safety”.

Mr. Bjorn Gronholm from United Baltic Cities also admitted that Marine litter is a global problem in our northern cities and on the coast. For example, waste from plastic decomposes for a very long time. We are trying to solve this issue, and our "Clean Beach" campaign helps to learn more about marine debris and how to deal with it”. HELCOM secretariat was presented via Mr. Alexey Bakhtov. Video about similar campaign in Tallinn culminated in welcoming part of the action.

At the end of the official part, environmental quest was launched. During stages of the quest, environmental volunteers not only collected garbage in the allotted territory, but also performed various tasks, both sporting and intellectual, so that each participant could show his individuality.

 Teams that took the first, second and third places received memorable prizes from the network of Nord Park rope park, NordStream2 and Opticom. And the most active volunteers who helped to organize the "Clean Beach" were awarded with certificates from one of the largest climbing walls in Russia – El Capitan.

The first place was taken by the team "Ti + Sc" (titanium + scandium), formed from the participants, who registered themselves via On-line registration. The team managed to stick together and earn most of all balls.

The second place was taken by the team "Ca" (calcium) from the College of Water Resources. The team collected the largest number of garbage bags. The third place went to the team "Ar" (argon), it is mixed team of representatives of organizations whose activities are related to environmental protection.

Participants could not only compete in the cleaning of the coastal territory, but also participated in the interactive quest program: fitness-warming up from licensed instructors of the Zumba Fitness program, a music set from a pop-rock band from St. Petersburg FLOOR SEVEN and a dance lesson in style Lindy-hip from the teachers of the dance school Summertime Swing School.

After active part of the program all participants were treated with hot tea with herbs and fed with delicious porridge from the field kitchen.

In the frame of event program HELCOM Guideline for Monitoring beach litter (pilot segment) was applied with leading of nominated by the Ministry of natural resources and ecology of Russian Federation expert for marine litter Ms. Liudmila Filatova.

The results of “Clean beach” campaign 2018 will be presented at HELCOM Pressure Meeting (October, 2018) and disseminated among interested.

     Campaign Clean Beach 2018 in Leningrad region   

   Background:

For the first time, the international campaign "Clean Beach" was held in 2014 as part of the International Project "Year of the Gulf of Finland - 2014". For 4 years, the "Clean Beach" campaign in St. Petersburg was held at various venues: in 2014 in Kronshtadt ("Dubki" park), 2015 - "Western Kotlin" reserve (Kronshtadt), 2016 - Krasnoselsky district and in 2017 -southwestern coast of the Kotlin island.

  For all details and suggestions please contact:

Ms. Natalia Bobyleva bobyleva@helcom.ru

Ms. Svetlana Tochanskaya svetlana@helcom.ru